The present invention relates to a protective coat and, more particularly, to a protective coat for protecting firefighters from fire and the heat associated therewith.
In suppressing a fire, firefighters are exposed to an extremely dangerous environment which includes falling debris, moisture, smoke, flames and intense heat. To protect himself from this hostile environment, the firefighter wears protective equipment, including a helmet, a protective coat, upper leg protection, boots and glooves. The protective coat typically comprises an outer shell having a collar and an inner liner inserted within the outer shell. The outer shell is a tough fabric designed to shed water and resist flame; whereas, the inner liner is a multi-layer fabric construction designed to thermally insulate the firefighter from extraordinary heat as well as prevent the passage of water or water vapor through the liner. In some protective coats, the inner liner is detachable to aid in washing and drying when the coat is not being used.
When the firefighter responds to an alarm, the coat should never be missing the inner liner. It may happen, however, that the firefighter accidentally forgets to insert the liner into the outer shell or that he intentionally decides not to insert the liner because the weather is too hot or because the liner is still wet from being washed or from being used during a previous fire. The firefighter might also decide not to insert the inner liner because of a belief that tha alarm was for an emergency other than fire suppression or that the liner is only for winter use. In any case, when the firefighter responds to an alarm wearing a coat without the liner, the life of the firefighter is seriously jeopardized because the firefighter is not thermally protected. Furthermore, failure to insert the inner liner may violate regulations which require that the liner should be worn in order to protect the firefighters from physical injury. Therefore, the person responsible for supervising the firefighters needs a way to be visually assured that all of the firefighters are wearing coats having the inner liner. Since there may be many firefighters at the scene of a fire and since the condition at the scene of the fire is quite hectic, the supervisor must be able to check the coat of each firefighter quickly and easily at one glance and be reasonably assured to the inner liner is present without having to needlessly interrupt the firefighters to check the coats.
A protective garment or coat is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,507,806, issued Apr. 2, 1985, and comprises an outer shell having an annular tab extending from the neck of the outer shell, an inner liner, and a collar attached to the inner liner rather than the outer shell. The tab is fabricated from a bright fluorescent material and is covered by the collar of the inner liner when the coat is fully assembled so that the bright fluorescent material does not show. Therefore, when the firefighter is wearing this coat, the presence of the bright tab should be an immediate indication to the supervisor that the coat is missing the liner.
In several situations, however, this coat may fail to provide an immediate indication that the liner is missing. First, it is possible that the bright tab may be obstructed from view by something other than the collar of the liner. For example, a regular shirt collar could be pulled through the neck opening in the outer shell to cover the tab in the absence of the liner. The tab could also be obstructed by facial hair. Second, it is possible that the bright tab might be obstructed from view while the firefighter is trying to extinguish the fire with his back toward the supervisor, e.g., it might be obstructed from view by the bill of the helmet worn by the firefighter or by the firefighter's hair. Thus, the location of a bright tab under the liner collar does not necessarily provide an easy or quick indication that the inner liner is missing.
Accordingly, there is a need for a protective coat that the supervisor can check with a single glance to determine quickly and easily that the liner is missing, without having to interrupt the firefighter needlessly while the firefighter attempts to extinguish the fire.